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| My
First Time Snowboarding |
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Rating
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Kilnovec, Czech Republic
Mar 07, 2003
Pros:
great fun and very entertaining
Cons:
Palmers, not chairlifts
The past weekend, I went snowboarding for the first time with 3
friends from residence (Aly from Toronto, Vincent from Montreal,
and Bex from New Zealand) and one of my Czech friends, Vera. The
resort is about 2.5 hours Northwest of Prague.
We left at 6:30am on Saturday morning to take a tram to the car
rental agency in the old city. Seeing as I was fighting a losing
battle against a stomach ailment from a fried cheese sandwich the
night before, I decided to take an Immodium pill before we left.
Not to get too graphic, but I found out about an hour and thirty
minutes into our trip that the way Immodium works is it dries up
your stomach and drains it via your bladder. We were already in
the countryside and there was no gas station in site and stopping
on the side of the one lane (for both ways) highway would have been
far too dangerous. Seeing as I was driving the manual car, I quickly
switched into 5th gear and put the pedal to the metal. As the beads
of sweat began to form on my forehead and my bladder neared an explosion
tantamount to Pearl Harbour, I raced through the winding mountain
roads. We finally pulled into the parking lot of the resort which
was luckily surrounded by a thick forest. I ran to the closest tree
I could find which was out of sight of all the young families and
enjoyed sweet relief.
Then came the snowboarding. We started our run at the top of the
hill. I took quite a few spills on my way down but it was very fun,
more so than skiing. The problem was when I got to the bottom of
the hill. Instead of a nice chairlift to get to the top, this resort
had palmers which are basically long braided steel ropes with a
little plate on the end that you put through your legs and it pulls
you up the mountain. For skiing it makes a lot of sense, but on
a snowboard you’re standing sideways and it doesn’t
work quite as well. When you’re not actually snowboarding,
one of your feet is detached from the board so you can push yourself.
I managed to make it to the gate and was quite pleased. I pushed
myself up to the loading area and waited for the palmer. As it came
around, I grabbed it, put it through my legs and as I tried to get
my back foot on the snowboard, the tension tightened on the rope,
jerking me forward and knocking me directly onto my ass. I got up
and tried again…I miserably failed. I went to the back of
the line to give myself a break and regroup. As I approached the
palmer again, the 2 lift operators rolled their eyes back in their
heads and began jabbering in Czech. I’m not sure what they
said, but their hysterics gave me a pretty good idea. For a third
time the palmer put me directly on my ass. I came back for a fourth
attempt as determined as the Leafs are to win the cup this year
(GO LEAFS GO!). I put the palmer between my legs, got my foot in
and held on for dear life. I managed to get on for about 15 feet
before hitting a rut in the trail and planting my face right in
the snow, hitting my jaw on the way down. I heard loud snickering
from a group of people and looked up to see a group of about 25
ten year old children howling away. At least I provided some good
entertainment for them, a great source of consolation. I eventually
made it up and had a great weekend and by the end could almost get
down a full run without falling. I must say that as an accomplished
skier, this was a very humbling weekend. |
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